So many times we have heard the title responsible for this or that activity used. But what does it mean to be responsible for an activity or function?
The answer, however simple, is not always clear in people's heads, both the delegated persons and the delegating persons do not have very clear what the delegation entails and how manage the delegation of responsibility.
The simple answer is that the attribution of the responsibility means empowering to make decisions. Decisions that may be revealed in whole or in part appropriate in retrospect.
Let's see together some examples of decisions that the managers of an activity or a function can and must make:
| Responsible | Decision |
| Channel commercial manager | Offer a discount to a customer |
| Head of Marketing | Allocate advertising budget to one channel or another |
| Graphic manager | Layout of the flyer |
| Logistics and transport manager | Accept a quote for B2C shipments |
| Responsible human resources | Choose the provider for training courses |
In the last ten years or so as Function Manager (RdF) of the e-commerce and digital channel for various companies in the fashion sector, I have had the opportunity to make many decisions regarding the assortment of the e-commerce channel for the company I worked for. , approve graphic proposals for web pages and newsletters, choose content management platforms and many others. Every decision implies different levels of responsibility, authority and decision-making autonomy.
| Activity Manager | Decision | Higher Hierarchical Level |
| Head of Function | Purchase of new software | Approval |
| Head of Function | Change of promotional calendar | Ex ante information |
| Head of Function | Optimization of the home page of the site | Ex post information> report |
| Direct report of the RdF | Product newsletter approval | Ex post information> report |
| Direct report of the RdF | Activation of a new payment method | Ex ante information |
Centralization vs. Decentralization
In a decentralized organization, employees are empowered to make decisions, so action can be taken quickly to solve problems, and employee input is considered. The more lower-level employees have the power to make decisions, the more decentralized an organization is.
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One of the key factors for the success of managers, which in this case means the ability to carry out certain activities by bringing them to a conclusion, lies precisely in making decisions that are essential to the progress of activities, especially routine activities.
Let's imagine for a second that all the activities we have listed so far, from organizing a training course to sending a newsletter, need to be brought to the attention of a company's CEO for their continuation. It should be clear enough that the chief executive officer of that company is likely to be overworked and the activities to suffer slowdowns due to the centralization of approvals.
This is a typical case of a bottleneck, due to failure delegation management.
However, it is not easy to define where a manager's autonomy in making decisions ends and where the need for the higher hierarchical level begins from carry out its coordination and control function.
While it is true that the manager's duty is to make decisions to carry out the activities, it is equally true that it is the duty of the higher hierarchical level to harmonize the decisions made by the various managers and ensure that the activities managed by the managers go in the right direction.
Some organizational and managerial tools help us to solve this dilemma:
- 3 or 5 year strategic plans and roadmap;
- Annual budgets, objectives (MBO);
- Business organization;
- Corporate culture and guidelines;
- Escalation path defined;
- Planning and sharing meetings;
- Management by exception
These tools allow managers to define the activities to be carried out on paper in advance and obtain the necessary approvals for carrying out the same. An example could be the purchase of a CRM software necessary for the marketing department. Being a purchase with a significant budget and an impact on the team's resources, the function manager will discuss this with the higher hierarchical level during the budget meetings that are held starting from the beginning of the second half of the current year to finish earlier. at the end of the current year with the approval of the budget for the following year.
The American-style organization
A worker reports to a manager. A manager reports to a director, a director reports to a vice president, and a vice president reports to a C-level senior leader, like a chief executive officer or a chief administrative officer. If you've ever worked in a corporate setting, you're likely to recognize this as the basic set of layers of an organization's structure.
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Chain of command
Two additional concepts go along with the idea of chain of command. The first, authority, describes the rights inherent in a managerial position to give orders and to expect the orders to be obeyed. The second, unity of command, describes the concept that a subordinate should only have one superior to whom he or she is directly responsible. If unity of command doesn't exist, there's a likelihood that a subordinate will be responding to commands from different people and experiencing a dilemma of competing priorities, which isn't productive.
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